Hotelplan UK hopes to sell more product through the trade following its acquisition of Explore Worldwide and Regaldive, according to chief executive Andy Perrin.
Speaking after the acquisition of the two niche businesses from Holidaybreak Group for an undisclosed sum, he said the addition of Explore would help Hotelplan offer a year-round product to increase sales through agents who do not currently sell all of its trade brands.
He said: “There will be agents who sell our ski brands but don’t sell Explore or the other way round. We will have some exciting discussions about how we can move our mutual businesses in that direction.”
Regaldive is currently direct-sell but Perrin admitted there “may be an opportunity” to work more with the trade in future. He said: “My top priority is to get to know the team but it is one of the things that we will be discussing.”
He described the acquisition of the operators as a “perfect fit” for Hotelplan UK’s portfolio of brands.
He said: “It all just fits. There are opportunities now for us to look at more than one kind of holiday for our customers. We have been heavily winter-centric but Explore’s strongest months are in spring, summer and autumn.”
He added: “If you look at our ski businesses, one of the challenges we have recognised over recent years is that the 45-50 age group is getting more adventurous and fitter and we can see more of them drifting off on adventure holidays so when this opportunity came up we jumped on it.”
The UK division of Hotelplan owns Inghams, Esprit, Ski Total, and Santa’s Lapland, all of which have a customer base Perrin believes would be interested in buying adventure or diving breaks.